Social Work's Historical Relationship to Volunteerism - Lyceum Books

72 Chapter 5 Social Work’s Historical Relationship to Volunteerism
admitted that his knowledge was too limited, and he doubted his competency in
drawing a valid conclusion. Moreover, his six criteria represent only one approach
to assessing professional status—an approach based upon a medical model of practice
that emphasizes specialization (Austin, 1983; Specht & Courtney, 1994). Social
work will never meet this criteria because its focus is the antithesis of specialization.
Instead, social work is a profession that applies theories derived from other
fields to enhance the well-being of individuals and advocate socially and economically
just societies. Social work needs to abandon its preoccupation with identifying
a discipline-specific body of knowledge, accept its position as an applied profession,
and begin steering all its attention toward interdisciplinary efforts to develop
knowledge that will help address specific social problems.
The lack of a unified knowledge base and the preoccupation with finding or
claiming one have left social work insecure about its professional status. Gambrill
(2001) suggests the profession’s insecurity is evident in its reliance on information
that is authority based rather than evidence based. As a result, social work remains
apprehensive about expanding its relationship with volunteers because it fears it
could jeopardize its professional status in society. In the same way, the social work
profession has attempted to define itself as separate from its volunteer origins. Partnering
with volunteers to deliver services and address social problems gives volunteers
access to the social welfare turf that the profession has worked so hard to establish
for itself and threatens the profession’s perceived authority over that turf.
Gambrill (2001) explains that social work has been “bamboozling the public and
those who fund service programs into believing that professionals offer unique services
that require specialized training and experience” (p. 170). The reality is that
social work interventions steeped in psychotherapeutic strategies and a medicalmodel
approach, while serving to protect social work’s professional status, are of
limited use when it comes to addressing social problems that affect the most vulnerable
and oppressed groups of people—the stated emphasis of the work of the
profession (National Association of Social Workers, 1999).
Partnering with volunteers is an alternative way for social workers to develop
and deliver services. Social workers need to see volunteers as partners in their quest
to bring about social change (Bruggemann, 2002). Instead of practicing as experts
providing care or as agents representing large social service bureaucracies, social
workers can work side by side with volunteers, helping to support and direct them
in the promotion of social and economic justice. Expanding practice with volunteers,
however, will require social work to gain a level of confidence that will allow
it to abandon its obsession with its professional status.
AVOIDANCE
As a result of social work’s professional insecurity, the profession has tended to
avoid practice with volunteers. A decade after Flexner’s presentation, Jane Addams